


AU Shisui War Fic (or 'The Author Can't Seem to Make Up a Decent Title')

by DoodlesOfTheMind



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Gen, M/M, Mild Language, Platonic Soulmates, Shisui looks out for Itachi, non-massacre
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-19
Updated: 2014-01-19
Packaged: 2018-01-09 06:01:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1142334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoodlesOfTheMind/pseuds/DoodlesOfTheMind
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shisui leaned down and kissed Itachi’s forehead lightly. “Do you think you can rest now?”<br/>One corner of Itachi’s mouth turned up as he said, “Why, exactly, did you phrase that as if I had a choice?”<br/>“You know me too well,” he said, chuckling. “Bed.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	AU Shisui War Fic (or 'The Author Can't Seem to Make Up a Decent Title')

Uchiha Shisui sat alone on the western bank of the Naka river, waiting and wishing. They’d been a team since they graduated the Academy and frequently worked together in ANBU, but this time, Itachi had been sent out alone. He had been gone three months now, and no one had heard from him. No one would say where he was, what he was doing, or when he would be back. No one would even confirm that he was still alive. _He has to be,_ Shisui told himself. _Uchiha Itachi, tensai of the clan and Jounin of Konoha, cannot be dead. He’s too strong for that, too damn stubborn for that._ The words sounded hollow, even in his own mind. So he tried them aloud.

“He’s alive. He’s alive.” Shisui repeated the words over and over until he fell asleep in the dirt, listening to the rushing water carry his voice away downstream.

He was a disheveled mess when he met up with his team at dawn the next morning, but Shisui really couldn’t bring himself to care. Rukia, the blonde teenage girl who had made Chunin the same year as him, cast a concerned look in his direction. He didn’t meet her eyes, afraid that if he did, she would see how red his own were. Not Sharingan crimson, but bloodshot and raw. No, he couldn’t let her see that.

“Have you heard a word I just said?” the silver haired Captain snapped, smacking Shisui in the head.

“Sorry, Kakashi-san. I...” he trailed off, finding no excuse that Hatake Kakashi, master of excuse-making, would possibly believe. “Forgive my lapse in attention.”

Kakashi sighed, irritated, but not yet truly angry. He had been Itachi’s Captain for nearly three years, before everything had gone to hell. He gave Shisui a knowing look and said, “The conflict at the Kiri border isn’t going well. The Hokage is sending two squads in as backup, ours and Ibiki’s. Be ready to leave in an hour.”

“Yes, sir,” Shisui said.

He gathered his chakra and used the Shunshin jutsu to cross the distance back to the Uchiha estate in less than a minute. He packed mechanically, neatly, making everything fit in his pack with no wasted space. Weapons, clothes, emergency rations, water, money, medical supplies. His hand lingered over long rectangular box with the character for baka, idiot, that had been carved into the lid with a kunai so many years ago. Ever since they were kids, Shisui had kept a two week supply of Itachi’s medicine on hand for when the boy neglected to take care of himself. More than once, the two of them had been on a mission together and Itachi had run out, leaving Shisui’s foresight as the only thing standing between him and his secret illness. He didn’t know why, but he slid the thin box of syringes down into his bag. _This is stupid. I don’t even know where he is,_ he thought, almost taking it back out, but his hand only zipped up the compartment. In a way, carrying the familiar little box with him almost felt like having Itachi there. He laughed ruefully as he imagined how his pragmatic little cousin would tease him about being a sentimental fool when he heard about this, and that decided it.

He met up with his team again at the village’s eastern gate, feeling the corner of the little box digging into his back. Kakashi set a merciless pace, and the week-long journey to the border took a mere three days. The first thing Shisui noticed when they approached the Konoha camp was the smell of acrid smoke, not the kind that came from burning ordinary wood, but that produced by the chakra-fueled flames of ninjutsu. The second was way the thick mists on all sides made one feel hemmed in, trapped, always trying to peer through the murk for a better glimpse of the terrain or potential enemies. It was enough to drive a man mad.

A Konoha sentry intercepted them within seconds and led them back to a small city of muddy tents, and Shisui realized that “not going well” was an understatement. Everyone he saw was bandaged, limping, or otherwise showing signs of injury. A girl he’d known in the Academy, now a Jounin herself, stood beside a fire and waved him over as his teammates started setting up their tents.

“Shisui-kun? Holy hell! Who did you piss off to wind up out here?” she asked, wrapping an arm around his shoulders.

Only one arm. Saya did not give one-armed hugs. Shisui pulled away from her and stared at the empty left sleeve of her shirt. “What the fuck happened to you?”

She slapped him on the shoulder, knocking him back a step. “No tact. None at all. You’d think being best friends with the heir to your clan since you were two would’ve taught you a bit.”

The mention of Itachi sent a stab through Shisui’s heart, but the rage in Saya’s cobalt eyes forced him to put it aside. “How...”

“Why do you think we needed backup? From what we can tell, we’ve got at least two of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist out there.” She gestured at her missing limb. “Crazy sumbitch by the name of Kisame did this. I’d have bled out if it weren’t for the Captain, not that I’m going to be thanking him for cauterizing it while I was still _conscious._ Right bastard, he is, but he kept me alive.”

Shisui shook his head, stunned. He’d been an assassin for years, but this kind of ongoing battle where the walking wounded could talk about their own near-deaths without batting an eye... “I’m so sorry, Saya-chan. How long until you get transported back to Konoha?”

She snorted. “You think I’d leave all this behind? Nah! I’ve been giving the wounded what help I can here. I might enroll in the medical school when this is all over. Misao-chan says she’ll sponsor me, she even put it in her will in case...you know.”

An awkward silence ensued, and Shisui found that for what might be the first time in his life, he had no words to say. He and Saya had been Genin together, they’d dated for a while until she’d dumped him, and they’d wound up in each other’s apartments in the middle of the night a few times a month since then. And now, she was a cripple. Strong, fearless, blunt, beautiful Saya was a cripple. Strangely, Shisui was reminded of his mother and sister, who had died fighting beside him during the carnage of the Third Shinobi War when he was barely more than a child. So strong, and then just...gone.

“Fuck, are you crying?” she asked quietly. “Damn it Uchiha Shisui, you do not get to cry for me! Don’t you dare!”

He wiped the single tear from his cheek and attempted his old cocky grin. “Wasn’t crying, bitch. Why would I cry for you?”

She smiled, accepting the gesture of normalcy. “Get your tent up. The Captain will be back tonight, assuming he’s still breathing. Wouldn’t want him thinking our backup is some incompetent Genin who can’t even put a shelter together.”

Shisui chuckled. “You really respect this guy, don’t you?”

“Hard not to. If it weren’t for him, we’d all be dead by now. Who would’ve thought he had it in him?” she said, her voice shaking a little. “Tent. I’ll bring you some supper in a bit.”

He was tempted to make a joke about women and kitchens, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it, not now that Saya was like this. He started setting up the thick canvas in silence until Rukia knelt beside him, threading the poles through the fabric.

“That was painful to watch,” she said, not looking at him. “She’s going to be a real mess when this is over. I’ll have to make a note for the Hokage to put her under watch for a month or so, make sure she doesn’t self-destruct on us. I felt her chakra, and she’ll be a good medic if she can adapt.”

Shisui nodded numbly. “I’ve known her since we were kids. I can’t believe it...”

“Bit of advice, just don’t think about it. Not until we’re home,” she said, her voice so soft that he had to strain to hear her. “Once you’re back in your warm, safe little apartment, you can rage and scream and down a bottle of sake if you have to, but don’t let it distract you out here. She sure won’t.”

Shisui nodded again and pounded the tent stakes into the soft earth with more force than was really necessary. Rukia squeezed his shoulder and left him alone, and Shisui sat in his tent for a moment, thinking. _This is just another war, and I am a shinobi of Konoha. This is why I exist. I can hold it together for however long it takes. I will not die here, not without seeing Itachi again. I can handle this._ He took a slow breath and set out to make himself useful around the camp until he was needed.

He wound up chopping firewood with Kakashi, letting the mindless, repetitive motion calm him. He had a feeling that the older shinobi was doing the same thing, though it was tough to tell what was going on behind that navy mask. Neither of them spoke, but the rhythm of their axes slowly synchronized into a steady beat. _Thunk. Thunk thunk. Thunk. Thunk thunk._

Saya’s Captain didn’t come back that night. Or the next. On the third day, Aoshi, an older man with one arm in a sling, took charge. Kakashi’s team was put to work patrolling the perimeter of the camp, since Shisui’s Sharingan and Rukia’s chakra sensing abilities were well suited to detecting enemies, even through mist and genjutsu. Half of Ibiki’s team stuck around camp to provide a few able bodied shinobi as protection while the other two had gone out with three of the less wounded shinobi to harry the enemy supply lines.

Shisui came back that night, hoping to just report an uneventful patrol and get some shut-eye when he saw a crowd huddled near the center of the camp. Saya caught his eye and smiled, gesturing for him to join her.

“Oy! Move it, assholes!” Saya snapped, shoving a few of her comrades out of the way so Shisui could see.

In the center of the crowd was a young man, a boy, really, not more than fifteen, with his long raven hair pulled back behind his head in a single tail. He was terribly pale and thin, the hitai-ate across his forehead was battered, and his clothes were splattered with blood and the gods only knew what else, but he stood tall and straight, addressing the men before him with the solemn confidence of a seasoned battle commander.

“Aoshi-san, thank you for keeping things in order. I hope you will forgive my lateness. There was some small trouble along the river, and we were forced to circle around,” he began, and the man behind him laughed and clapped a hand on his shoulder.

“The little Captain’s too modest. That ‘small trouble’ was a dozen Kiri ANBU, and before we ‘circled around,’ he dropped the bastards with a genjutsu straight from hell,” he said. “Me and Megumi hardly had to lift a finger!”

The younger man grimaced and shrugged away from him. “We found out how they’ve been getting through our lines. They’ve been using an old network of tunnels. It’s barely passable, but it lets out about half a mile West of us. I want three squads at the exit tonight, and a minimum of two earth jutsu specialists. Kill anything that comes out, then seal it behind you. We don’t have the manpower to take prisoners,” he added bitterly.

A wave of nods went through the crowd, but Shisui couldn’t move. Couldn’t even breathe. As the crowd began to disperse, the young Captain’s shoulders slumped almost imperceptibly, jerking as he suppressed a cough. No one but Shisui would have noticed it, but the young man seemed to sense that he’d been caught and glanced up.

“Itachi...” Shisui whispered.

The young man’s shoulders jerked again, and this time, his gaunt face turned slightly pink with the knowledge that he’d been seen. “Shisui-san, I did not expect to see you here.”

It took all of Shisui’s considerable self control not to punch him. And kiss him. And kick him into next week. He settled for snatching his arm and manhandling him across the muddy camp and into his tent, heedless of the stares he was getting. “You little...no letters, not a one...weather like this...damp, cold...taking care of yourself...half dead...”

“Shisui-san, please calm down,” Itachi said, not resisting as Shisui shoved him down on the thick canvas floor and wrapped him in a blanket. “I’m a mess, cousin. Do not ruin your things over me.”

Shisui tied a knot in the blanket, pinning Itachi’s arms to his sides within it. “Think I care...had worse things on my blankets...little prat...”

Itachi sighed and waited, motionless and silent, while Shisui rummaged through his pack. His hand closed around the little wooden box that he had carried from Konoha. Itachi leaned away from him when Shisui pulled out a syringe, already pre-filled with clear liquid.

“If you intend to use that, it would help if my arms were not buried under two layers of fabric,” Itachi said tentatively.

 “Might just jab you in the neck,” Shisui muttered, but he undid the knot with a rough pull. “How long have you been without?”

Itachi didn’t answer.

“Tell me!” Shisui snapped, but his hands were gentle as he rolled up Itachi’s right sleeve and ran a sterilizing pad over a patch of skin on his arm.

“I’d been taking half doses for the first month or so to make them last. Nothing since then,” he said, not flinching when Shisui stuck the needle into him.

Shisui gave him a withering glare. “That’s almost two months with nothing.”

“Please do not lecture me,” Itachi said, just a little too quickly. “Supplies haven’t been getting through regularly, especially since the Kiri shinobi found that tunnel to slip around us.”

Shisui set the box of syringes aside and started unbuckling Itachi’s flak vest. He punched the ground when he saw just how thin the younger man had gotten. “You can’t keep doing this to yourself, ‘Tachi. You shouldn’t even be out here.”

Itachi stared ahead, focused on nothing while Shisui examined him for injuries. There was a half-healed gash along his ribs, and multiple bruises and minor cuts, but nothing too serious. _Nothing but his lungs filling with fluid until he drowns on dry land and his heart gives out,_ Shisui thought viciously. It was some kind of cruel twist of fate that the most gifted shinobi the Uchiha clan had ever produced was so sick, and so skilled at hiding it that no one but his parents, Shisui, and the clan medic, Kagura, had any idea. When he took his medication regularly, Itachi did well enough, but without it...

“Are you quite satisfied that I have not perished in your absence?” Itachi asked, hiding another cough. “I believe half the camp is trying to figure out what you are doing to me in here. Did you have to make such a spectacle of yourself, dragging me around like that?”

 _And that’s the sound of Itachi working himself up to stay awake for another two days. Better head that off quickly._ “You’re going to go back to your tent, clean up, and put on the warmest clothes you have. I’ll bring you some food, which you will finish every bite of, and then you are going to sleep as long as you possibly can. No one, and I mean no one, is going to disturb you. Anything else you want to do can wait. Got it, chibi?”

Itachi opened his mouth to protest, but Shisui shook his head firmly and Itachi closed it again with a defeated sigh. “As you wish.”

 _No guilt trips, not this time._ He always felt bad when Itachi, who was the de facto head of the Uchiha clan and Shisui’s superior in every meaningful way, caved to him. Shisui, who could bend a mind with genjutsu so advanced that the target would think that he wanted nothing more than to obey whatever command he was given, could break Itachi’s will with simple words. No one else could do that. No one else would bother to try. For years, Shisui had been uncomfortable about it and had tried to force Itachi to stand up to him. Other times, he thanked the gods that the young heir would listen to _someone._ There had been many a mission where his squadmates had half-carried the exhausted young man back to the Uchiha compound and refused to leave him with anyone but Shisui, the only one who would call Itachi’s murmured ‘I’m fine’ for what it was. Complete and utter bullshit.

Itachi rose and pulled his vest back on, his hand trembling ever so slightly. “Are you very angry with me, Shisui-nii-san?”

“I’m furious,” Shisui said gently. “Trust me when I say that I’m going to rip old man Sarutobi a brand new asshole for sending you out here.”

Itachi’s dark, hazy eyes scanned his face, checking how serious he was. The boy never did seem to understand when he was joking. Then again, Shisui wasn’t sure if he was this time. Three months in a fucking war zone, sick, exhausted, and apparently also in charge. And he was still just a kid. After everything the Hokage had put him through, he owed Itachi more than this.

“Go on, ‘Tachi. I’ll be right behind you,” he said quietly.

Itachi nodded and walked away.

Ten minutes later, Shisui slipped through the flaps of Itachi’s tent with a hunk of bread and a steaming bowl of whatever-we-could-catch stew in his hands. The younger boy had changed into clean clothes and was kneeling on the floor, sharpening his ninjato with long, precise strokes and very deliberately ignoring Shisui’s presence.

Shisui set the food aside and carefully pulled the blade out of his hands. “Eat. Now.”

Itachi looked like he was going to argue for a moment, but he picked up the bowl and sniffed at it. “Do I want to know what this is?”

“No, you really don’t,” Shisui said. “My teammate Rukia cooked it, so I know it hasn’t been tampered with. Can’t vouch for the taste.”

Itachi took a bite, and then another, and Shisui could tell that it was taking a lot of effort for the boy not to simply bring the bowl to his lips and drain it in a single gulp. If he’d been alone, maybe he would have. Even the perfectly sophisticated, well-raised, well-bred Itachi had limits. _When’s the last time he ate something?_ Shisui wondered sadly, watching him. _Days ago, knowing him. Probably gave his rations to a stray dog._

After a few minutes, Itachi hesitated, swirling the spoon in the liquid. “I’ve had enough.”

“All of it, ‘Tachi,” Shisui ordered.

Itachi gave him a pained look, but didn’t take another bite.

“You’ve lost a lot of weight, little cousin. You need to eat.”

“I did, and I will again tomorrow,” Itachi said stubbornly.

“Spoiled brat,” Shisui muttered and took the bowl out of his hands. Very gently, he pulled the younger boy into his lap and wrapped a thick blanket around him. Itachi leaned into him, not realizing the trap until Shisui had a spoonful of soup hovering in front of him.

“Shisui-nii-san, please—” he began, and Shisui pushed the spoon between his lips.

“Nope. Now eat, dammit,” Shisui said cheerfully, bringing another spoonful up.

Itachi glared, but he opened his mouth and let Shisui feed him another bite. “You can release me. I’ll finish it, if that’s what you want,” he said after he swallowed.

Shisui set the spoon aside and ran a hand through Itachi’s long hair, now loose from the red tie that normally restrained it. A tiny smile turned up the corners of Itachi’s mouth and he turned to bury his face in the older boy’s shoulder, encouraging Shisui to hold him closer. “Do you really want me to let go of you?” Shisui murmured in his ear.

Itachi made a low sound in his throat that Shisui knew meant no.

“Good.” He squeezed him tight for a moment, and then shifted his arms so Itachi’s face was visible again. “Bread?”

Itachi nodded and bit off a small chunk from the piece Shisui held in front of him.

“So, Captain, eh?” Shisui said after a few minutes. “When did you let that happen? They’ve been trying to give it to you for years now.”

Itachi looked away. “Yuki-san wasted her last breath to promote me.”

Captain Nara Yuki, a middle aged woman from the clan of shadow manipulators and one of the best strategists in Konoha, was probably the closest thing to a friend Itachi had outside the Uchiha clan. Their day-long go and shogi matches were the stuff of legend in the ANBU headquarters, and betting on them had become a common way to waste a paycheck over last few years. And now she was dead, another casualty.

“Kami. I’m sorry, ‘Tachi,” Shisui said, and fed him another spoonful to save him from the need to reply. Typical Itachi, he didn’t accept the gesture of kindness.

“So am I,” he whispered. “Without her, I would have...everyone...you...”

Shisui shushed him. “I know, but you didn’t. You found another way. It’s okay, ‘Tachi,” he murmured.

It had been in one of his matches with Yuki that Itachi had seen the way out of the terrible predicament that the Uchiha elders and the village council had put him in two years ago. Itachi had been losing a game of shogi badly, though the casual observer would have thought the board looked fairly equal. Shisui had watched Itachi play enough times to see the blunder and realized that whatever move he made, Yuki was going to have him in a few turns. All Itachi could do at that point was choose whether to drag it out, or end it quickly and relatively painlessly. Little Sasuke had had his life savings riding on the game, and Itachi had known that, so he’d...well, cheated. Itachi had cast a subtle genjutsu over his opponent so that when her turn came, she overlooked the opening Itachi had left her in favor of a more obvious attack. It was a common ploy, and not truly cheating in a strict sense of the word. Everyone agreed that you should use whatever skills you have to win, and even after Yuki had realized what he’d done, she’d only laughed, made a few jokes about the Uchiha clan producing nothing but inbred, deceitful bastards, punched him in the stomach, and that was the end of it.

When both choices are evil, you don’t pick the better of the two, you find a third. When Itachi was offered the ultimatum of slaughtering his family or allowing the Uchiha coup d'etat to move forward against Konoha, he’d rejected both options, as well as his own honor. After trying to settle things in the shadows and finding no success, he’d openly declared the clan council to be traitors. Itachi had turned over his father, the elders, and Lord Madara to the Hokage and had shielded those who weren’t involved, mainly the lower ranking families and the few civilians of the clan, from the worst of the repercussions. Then he’d thrown himself at the mercy of the clan, offering to end his life if they felt that he had betrayed them too greatly to be forgiven. There were a few who had called for him to do exactly that, but in the end, Lord Fugaku had stopped him, instead praising his eldest son for having the mind and soul of a true Uchiha shinobi, and announcing that he would surrender on the condition that the Hokage did not execute him until the day Itachi turned sixteen and was of age to legally succeed him as head of the clan.

That same night, Itachi had confessed everything to Shisui, shaking uncontrollably as he told him about Danzo and Madara, his two dark mentors, and their conflicting demands. He’d cried for the first time since he was an infant when he told him what he would have done if he’d truly had to choose, starting with his need for the Mangekyo, and then his plan to leave little Sasuke alive to rebuild the clan after him. When he’d finished, he’d just...sat there for hours, his empty eyes staring at nothing. He hadn’t asked for forgiveness or understanding, and he hadn’t even reacted when Shisui had shouted at him, shoved him, and eventually pulled a kunai on him. When Shisui had finally lost patience and struck him, Itachi had gone into one of his coughing fits, revealing that he hadn’t taken his medicine in over six months. He admitted that he’d been hoping to die before he had to make the choice, or at least to be too weak to carry it out when he did.

“So, what was next on your list of demands? I find my memory failing me,” Itachi said quietly after Shisui had finished feeding him.

Shisui swatted him lightly, putting the painful thoughts aside. Itachi was here, alive, and had recovered somewhat from the despair that had gripped him back then. “Sleep. Eight hours minimum, more if you can manage it.”

Itachi rolled his eyes. “You are aware that I haven’t slept a full eight hours since before I enrolled at the Academy?”

“No wonder you’re such a grump ass. Bed,” Shisui ordered, pushing him toward the bedroll at the back of the tent.

Itachi burrowed into the pile of blankets and Shisui sat down beside him, allowing the boy, because he still thought of Itachi as a little boy in his heart, to lay his head in his lap. Itachi wriggled around for a few minutes before settling on his left side with his shoulder, arm, and head resting on Shisui’s legs, and Shisui draped an arm over him. They’d slept like this often, growing up. When Shisui had seen a dark purple bruise on the young heir’s face one day, Itachi wouldn’t tell him what happened, but Shisui had found out that he’d woken up screaming in the middle of the night, having a nightmare about the things he had done to defend his baby brother during the last weeks of the Third Shinobi War. Half the clan had come running, thinking he was being attacked, and when the truth came out, his father had given him a brutal thrashing for revealing weakness to his clansmen. The boy learned his lesson and never spoke of his dreams again, but they didn’t stop, even after ten years. But Itachi never had nightmares if Shisui crept in through his window and stayed with him until sunrise.

Not until tonight. Shisui was only dozing, and he woke instantly when he felt Itachi shift in his lap. He looked down as Itachi’s pale lips started trembling, not quite moving enough for him to make out the words the boy feared to say, but he knew them anyway. They were the same words he had whispered over and over on the nights Shisui had been late, when he had found him already in the middle of one of his nightmares. _No. I’m not a killer. Never again. I won’t. Please._

“It’s alright, ‘Tachi,” he murmured. “I’ve got you. You’re safe with me, and Sasuke’s safe at home. Everything’s going to be okay, now. Just rest, okay? Can you do that for me?” He wanted to say that Itachi would never have to go through that again, that he would never be forced to take another life, that he didn’t have to be a ninja anymore, that no one gave a damn if he was the Uchiha heir or not, and Shisui would take him away from Konoha anytime he wanted and fight anyone who came after them if he only said the word. He wanted to say so much more, as he had when they were children, but neither of them were naive enough to believe such things now. They never had been. It would only make it worse.

Itachi didn’t make a sound, but he flinched as if he’d been struck. Shisui shifted beneath him, bringing him closer so he could hold him against his chest. “Shh, ‘Tachi, you’re okay. I’ve got you. You don’t have to worry about anything while I’m here. You know that.”

Itachi struggled against his arms for a few seconds, and then stiffened as he realized what was happening. “Shisui-nii-san?” he whispered.

“Yeah, it’s me. I’ve got you,” Shisui said soothingly.

“Forgive me, I should never have let that happen.” Itachi tried to pull away from him, but Shisui didn’t allow it.

“How many times have we been through this, ‘Tachi? You don’t need to apologize to me,” he said. “Ever.”

Itachi coughed hard for a few minutes until he was gasping for breath. Shisui let him sit up to make it easier for him to breathe, but he kept him in his lap, gently cradling him against his shoulder until the fit subsided.

“Forgi—” Itachi began, but Shisui put a finger on his lips to silence him.

“What did I just say?” he warned sternly. Itachi let out a breath, acquiescing, and Shisui took his finger away to run his hand through Itachi’s long hair instead. “You can insist on being perfect with everyone else if you want to, but don’t you ever treat me like that. Do you hear me?”

Itachi looked up at him, his charcoal eyes softening a little, but he didn’t answer. Shisui knew he wouldn’t, it was too deeply ingrained into him to avoid admitting that he was anything less than the perfect shinobi he had been raised to be, but he didn’t mind. Itachi didn’t have to admit it, as long as he could still look at Shisui with those open, trusting eyes that no one else had ever been allowed to glimpse. That would be enough.

Shisui leaned down and kissed Itachi’s forehead lightly. “Do you think you can rest now?”

One corner of Itachi’s mouth turned up as he said, “Why, exactly, did you phrase that as if I had a choice?”

“You know me too well,” he said, chuckling. “Bed.”

Itachi reluctantly climbed out of Shisui’s lap and settled himself in his blankets again, but a few hours later, his eyes opened and he sat up. Shisui was turned on his side and sleeping like the dead at that point, but the loss of Itachi’s warmth made him reach out reflexively, searching for him. His fingers snagged a handful of silken ebony hair and gently pulled him back down.

“No, ‘Tachi,” he murmured, his voice still thick with sleep.

The younger boy let out a frustrated breath and settled back against him. “I should be there.”

Shisui knew he meant the ambush at the tunnel and sighed in exasperation. “What’s the point of having competent subordinates if you continuously micromanage everything?”

“What if they miss something that I would notice? What if men _die_ because I was sleeping?” Itachi demanded hotly. “I will not have more blood on my hands, Shisui-nii-san. Please understand that.”

 _You should never have been a shinobi,_ he thought sadly. “I do understand it, but what good will it do if you’re there, but you’re so exhausted that _you_ miss something? Or if you catch it this time, but you’re so tired tomorrow that you miss the next one? What if _you_ die because you’re asleep on your feet?”

Itachi fell silent, but the tension in his neck told Shisui that he was furious.

“Would I ask you to stay if I thought you being there would make a difference?” Shisui said tenderly. “It’s an ambush, not open battle. Your men have all the advantages. Running yourself into the ground won’t save anyone. You rested and at top form can save...a lot of them.” He couldn’t bring himself to say _everyone,_ because he knew Itachi would take it to heart, and that he would include even his enemies in that category.

Itachi’s shoulders slumped in defeat. He knew a solid argument when he heard one, but if any voice but Shisui’s had said it, it would have made little difference. Even now, he moved as if he was going to sit up again.

“Stay put,” Shisui growled.

Itachi rolled onto his back and closed his eyes, folding his hands over his stomach. It was his waiting pose, the one he would use when Shisui wanted him to sleep and Itachi knew it wasn’t going to happen. Either he’d stay like that the entire night, or Shisui would give in and let him up. He had never once fallen asleep this way.

“‘Tachi, don’t do this,” Shisui pleaded. “The entire war isn’t on your fucking shoulders.”

Itachi didn’t answer.

 _Okay, big guns, then._ “What am I going to tell Sasuke if you die out here?” he said. “Did you think about that? Are you going to do that to him? _Kami,_ do you _remember_   what he did when you were going to kill yourself?”

Itachi’s eyes snapped open, and even in the dark, Shisui knew they were glowing crimson with the Sharingan. The Uchiha heir’s anger was a terrible thing to behold and it seldom surfaced, but in that moment, Shisui was sure that Itachi was going to kill _him._ Seconds later, though, that fury turned inward, and Itachi’s hands slipped apart to fall to his sides as the Sharingan winked out of existence. It was the most broken, painful thing that the older Uchiha had ever witnessed. Shisui might be able to snap Itachi’s will like a dry twig, but for Sasuke, the young man would do it himself.

“I’m sorry, ‘Tachi,” he murmured, wrapping his arms around the boy. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

 

 

***

Shisui woke again as the dawn sunlight started to break through the mist. Itachi was still sleeping, but his face was far from peaceful. He was probably the only man who could worry in his sleep. Shisui stayed perfectly still, knowing that the slightest movement would wake him, but it was useless. Itachi was a shinobi of the highest caliber, and his charcoal eyes drifted open thirty seconds later.

“May I get up now?” he asked lifelessly.

If Shisui said no with Itachi like this, he knew the boy wouldn’t move, and he wouldn’t ask again. He hated that voice, and it hurt to be the cause of it, no matter what his reasons. “If you eat breakfast.”

Itachi nodded and untangled himself from the blanket and Shisui’s arms. He had to put a hand on the ground to steady himself when he sat up, the change in position almost triggering another of his episodes. Shisui had a syringe in his hand before Itachi could get to his feet.

“Two a day, ‘Tachi,” he said.

The younger boy silently took the needle from him, sticking it into his own vein without even having to search for it. He handed it back to show Shisui that he had injected every drop of the lifesaving liquid.

Shisui nearly smacked him, but he reminded himself that this couldn’t last long. Itachi was inherently incapable of true surrender for any length of time. He was a leader in his soul. So he stayed back and let Itachi go through the motions of dressing himself and donning his weapons, the catlike grace of his movements just a little muted, and followed him outside.

Predictably, the young Captain did not go straight to the makeshift mess hall, but to Aoshi, who sat on a low tree limb smoking his pipe. The older man dropped to the ground and murmured a few words that were too quiet for Shisui to hear, but they brought some life back into Itachi’s eyes. The ambush must have succeeded without any casualties.

“That is good to hear, Aoshi-san,” Itachi said. “Now that we are no longer fighting on both fronts, we can end this.”

Shisui heard the note of quiet determination in the younger Uchiha’s voice and smiled. He would be alright. True to his word, Itachi then made his way over to the roughly carved tables and accepted a chunk of bread and a few slices of meat without argument. Shisui stayed nearby, but far enough that Itachi had the space his rank deserved. After a while, some of the other officers joined him, all shooting glances at the older Uchiha when they thought Itachi wasn’t looking.

 _I guess I really embarrassed him yesterday,_ Shisui reflected. _No one here would dare tell him he needed rest, let alone haul him across the camp and throw him into their tent._

Saya confirmed this when she plopped down beside him. “Damn, what did you two get up to last night?” she teased, setting a plate between them. “Captain looks _good._ You do too, for that matter.”

“You are impossible,” he said fondly. “We’re cousins, Saya.”

She shrugged. “Never stopped the Hyuuga. I hear Hiashi-sama is considering allowing that little branch upstart to be betrothed to his daughter. The kid is his identical twin’s son! Doesn't that technically make them half-siblings?”

Shisui slugged her remaining arm. “Do _not_ compare me to that clan of nitwit perverts, gossip whore.”

“Careful, I’ve got Hyuuga blood in me somewhere a few generations back,” she said, grinning suggestively.

“That explains a lot,” Shisui muttered.

“Seriously, though, I’m glad you’re here,” she said quietly. “Someone had to do it.”

Shisui looked over at Itachi, who was deep in discussion with Kakashi, Aoshi, and a woman Shisui didn’t recognize. He had that look in his eyes that meant he was going to have at least half a dozen plans of attack by noon. If Itachi had his way, the war would be over by supper. “Yeah, someone did.”

**Author's Note:**

> Sequel pending, I'm undecided about whether I want to continue this one. I love the character dynamics so much, but I'm uncertain where to go with it long-term.
> 
> For the record, I do ship Neji and Hinata. That bit was just to show the Uchiha / Hyuuga clan rivalry.


End file.
